Shunts are small pieces of conductive material. In some applications, they are used as shunt resistors that pass high current while having a small voltage drop across the shunt resistor. The voltage drop across a shunt resistor is proportional to the current flow through the shunt resistor. Accordingly, the current flow through a device or circuit is readily derived by measuring the voltage drop across a shunt resistor.
Shunt resistors used in integrated circuits are typically fabricated on a sheet of conductive material, such as copper alloy, which is malleable. Etching or other processes are applied to the sheet to generate individual shunt resistors that are connected to one another by tabs or the like that hold the individual shunt resistors to the sheet during fabrication. An adhesive film is adhered to the bottom surface of the sheet to provide support to the etched sheet. An abrasive blade cuts or singulates the individual shunt resistors. Abrasive blades are typically coated with a fine grit that gets covered with ductile material from the adhesive film and the malleable material from which the sheet is made. These materials covering the blade result in the adhesive film tearing and blades breaking during singulation. Furthermore, the materials covering the blades result in poor singulation quality.